Spoiler Fixed

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

So much for getting our questions answered anytime soon. Lost's final season begins Feb. 2, but Michael Emerson says the cast is seven episodes away from filming the finale, and a resolution still feels far away. Emerson also discussed whether Ben will seek redemption, the extent of his character's evil, and ****.

TVGuide.com: How do you feel about heading into the end of the series?Michael Emerson: I feel great curiosity, because from what I've shot up to this point, I don't see any end in sight. The storyline is continuing to expand instead of contract. It's grown more fragmented, rather than becoming more unified. The threads aren't joining up, they're flying away. It will be dazzling to see. Certain big mysteries on this show are being answered. Every episode, something huge is falling into place, but it's still a mystery.

TVGuide.com: Would you like to see Ben get redemption at the end of Lost?Emerson: I don't know. I used to have more of a craving for an ending than I do now. Sometimes I think characters are maybe best left alone. I don't know why I thought redemption was going to be satisfying. Maybe what's satisfying is that some things never change. I think there will be all kinds of endings for all kinds of characters on our show, but maybe Ben just walks away to do whatever it is he's already been doing for his whole life.

TVGuide.com: No one knows what Ben's ultimate goal is. Does he want to take over the island, maybe the world? Is everything he does personal?Emerson: It seems like it's the island, the possession and control of the island, but what does that mean exactly? We still don't know what the island can be used for. Is it a tool? Is it a device? What does the device do? It must do something pretty big for people to be fighting over it so passionately. If that ends up being answered, that will be one of the big answers.

TVGuide.com: Do you think Ben feels bad for killing Jacob, or is that just another step in the right direction to reach his ultimate goal?Emerson: I think Ben has some kinds of remorse. He's quick to put them aside. It's almost like Ben understands that these deaths don't count the way other people think they count. There's some gaming going on. I don't know if that will be revealed either.

TVGuide.com: We saw last season that Sayid actually caused Ben to become the evil man he is today when he shot little Ben. Do you think he would still be evil if Sayid hadn't shot him?Emerson: One of the things we're dealing with is whether causality is a one-way dynamic. Do some things lead to other things? Can the course of events or characters be changed by going back and fiddling with them? That raises the question of what are we really looking at when people are moving around in time and space on Lost? Is it time travel or are we being treated to some storytelling or narrative device that we don't yet understand?

TVGuide.com: Did you know that was how Ben became evil as you've been playing him? That he may have had part of the smoke monster in him?Emerson: No, I still don't know what a bunch of that stuff means. I was surprised. I thought it was a neat thing when they had young Ben be shot by Sayid. I thought that it helped to moderate our view of him or justify some of his behavior.

TVGuide.com: There's still so much to learn about the Others. Will that be explored?Emerson: Some of it will be. It's not like they're a total mystery now. We know what the Others are. They're these people that arrived there for different reasons at different times and they fell under the sway of various powerful and ambitious men who wanted to rule the island. I don't know if the Others are clued in to why they're there or what the powers are.

TVGuide.com: Is there any chance of seeing Annie again?TVGuide.com: I had this discussion with Terry O'Quinn the other day. I said some of these plot lines are just going to go away unanswered, like the little carved figure that Ben keeps with him as a grownup. We haven't touched on that in two seasons now and I just fear that who Annie was, I don't think we're ever going to know. I think that's going to be one of the loose ends.

TVGuide.com: Everyone has been mum's the word about the final season of Lost, but executive producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse did reveal that ****.Emerson: It may not be as big a gift or spoiler from the producers as you might think.

TVGuide.com: ****Emerson: ****

TVGuide.com: Do you think fans will be satisfied with the final season of Lost?Emerson: Some will, some won't, I'm sure. That was bound to be, no matter what the ending is. There will be argument about it ... I have high hopes for it being one of those things where you go, "Oh my God, yeah!" or "Oh, it's been that all along. I never knew what I was looking at until now." I hope it's a thing that sends us back to Season 1 and makes us start looking at it all over again with new eyes.

Friday, October 16, 2009

Recent Emmy winner Michael emerson — just one the Losties who talked to us recently about the show's sixth and final season — promises it will resolve some but not all of fans' questions.

"I don't know if they'll be fully satisfied or not," Emerson says. "I don't know if we want to be fully satisfied. I think it's always best to go away wanting a little more."

You can forgive Emerson for being as enigmatic as his character, Ben Linus. But in interviews with TVGuide.com, his castmates (including Jorge Garcia, Daniel Dae Kim and Terry O'Quinn) did clarify three things that have nagged us since the fifth-season finale in May:

1. Yes, the bomb exploded. "Basically a bomb went off at the end of the last one and all bets are off," Garcia said. Adds Kim: "At the end of last season there was a big explosion." Of course, neither of them guaranteed that the bomb was Jughead, but we'll just assume it was to keep our heads from spinning.

2. We haven't seen the last of Juliet. ****

3. ****

Of course, the world of Lost is full of few constants and many variables. But whatever the writers have planned is worthy of the show's past secrets and reveals, O'Quinn promises: "When I read the first script, it's the first time in the whole series that I said, 'Wow, that's amazing,'" he said.

Wednesday, April 8, 2009

Note from Melissa: This article is pure speculation on who might die this season, based on a rumor that someone's going to. Anything based on actual spoilers rather than conjecture has been removed.

**** Putting aside for a second the fact that dying on Lost doesn't exactly mean a trip to the unemployment office, let's examine a few likely suspects, and then tell us who you think is going to take that long island dirt nap.

BENFOR HIM Last we saw him, little Ben was on death's door after getting plugged by Sayid. Sure, Richard Alpert said he could save him, but can he really? Plus, ****.AGAINST HIM In revealing the backstory of Ben's fractured childhood — and his fate at the hands of the Hostiles — the character has become infinitely more sympathetic. In addition, Lost appears to be headed toward a showdown between Ben and Widmore, and it's still too early for that confrontation to take place.NARRATIVE PUNCH Lost without Ben would certainly be duller. Good guy or bad, he has double-crossed nearly everyone in the cast.

CLAIREFOR HER There is a well-developed conspiracy theory that claims that Claire actually died in that explosion in her house in New Otherton. Supporters point to her last communication with Miles (aka Señor Ghostbuster), her abandonment of Aaron and her cozying up to Christian, her dead dad, inside Jacob's cabin.AGAINST HER There is no indication that Emilie de Ravin has been on set at all this season. Plus: *****NARRATIVE PUNCH There are still a few unanswered questions in Claire's backstory, but most revolve around the significance of Aaron. In short, we might like her more as a ghost.DESMONDFOR HIM Desmond would do anything to protect Penny and their son, Charlie — including die to save them.AGAINST HIM Daniel Faraday has hinted at Desmond's importance in the show's evolving time-travel conceit, in that the rules don't appear to apply to him. Now that the gang is stuck in 1977, he may be their only hope of rescue.NARRATIVE PUNCH Desmond is a popular character, especially with the lay-deez. (Holla!) They would riot if he was killed.

HURLEY FOR HIM Truthfully, there is no indication that it would be him.AGAINST HIM Hurley is the Oceanic 6's truth-teller; he keeps everyone honest. Hurley seems to be the most accessible character through which to tell the story of "the numbers," an annoying plot point that has yet to be adequately explained.NARRATIVE PUNCH Dude, it would totally suck.JULIETFOR HER ****AGAINST HER ****NARRATIVE PUNCH Long-suffering Juliet seems to have finally found peace with Sawyer among the Dharma Initiative. Killing her now would be especially harsh — and dramatically potent.

KATE FOR HER There were rumblings earlier in the season that ****, which sent Lost fans into a tizzy that Kate might be exiting.AGAINST HER The rumor was quickly silenced. ("Not even remotely true," a source told TVGuide.com.)NARRATIVE PUNCH Needless to say, losing Kate before the end of the series would be truly shocking.

PENNYFOR HER After Widmore killed Ben's "daughter," Alex, Ben pledged revenge. Last we saw Ben, he had an errand to run at what appeared to be a marina. He then boarded Ajira Flight 316 bloodied and bruised.AGAINST HER Penny and Desmond's globetrotting (indeed, time-trotting) romance has become the heart of the show. It would be downright cruel to break up this happily reunited couple after their long, torturous separation.NARRATIVE PUNCH Sucker. To the kidneys. And the heart. Sniff.

SAWYER FOR HIM As Jim LaFleur, Sawyer holds a prominent position within the Dharma Initiative. But as James Ford, survivor of Oceanic 815, he has other goals. As his two interests start to diverge, it's possible that Sawyer's double-agent routine will be discovered.AGAINST HIM The Kate-Jack-Juliet-Sawyer love rectangle is an endless source of discussion for the fans. They'd never remove one of the variables, would they?NARRATIVE PUNCH Killing Sawyer just as he redeemed himself would be bittersweet — and characteristic of Lost.

SAYIDFOR HIM After shooting little Ben, Sayid is Dharma Public Enemy No. 1.AGAINST HIM His recent declaration — "You were right; I am a killer" — seems to indicate the beginning of a redemption story arc.NARRATIVE PUNCH Hard to say. We love Naveen Andrews, but how much more do we need to know about Sayid?

SUN FOR HER She's hanging out with Christian lately, and he tends to show up, Grim Reaper-like, just before people meet their maker (see: Locke, Michael, Claire?).AGAINST HER Similar to Des and Penny, Sun and Jin's flawed romance sneaked up on us. Sun has already believed Jin dead; isn't that enough?NARRATIVE PUNCH Killing her off before (or even after) she finds Jin would make for some terrific drama.

Wednesday, April 1, 2009

"****"Is Young Ben dead? If he dies, how might Lost history be altered? If there are alterations, would they be substantial or not as significant as our hyperactive imaginations may think? Tonight's episode, ''****,'' offers the promise of answers. *****

While we wait for clarity, allow me to share this crazy, twisted thought that just entered my head: What if Young Ben neither lives nor dies in this episode but instead...falls into a coma? What if the rest of season 5 proceeds with the tension of knowing (and worrying) that should Ben die, history-negating paradox may occur? What if in the very last scene of the season, time-traveling Desmond, full of vengeance toward Ben for killing Penelope and Young Charlie, sneaks into Young Ben's hospital room, pulls the plug on Young Ben's life-support machine, and causes time to implode?

Sawyer: I thought you said this wouldn't happen!?Faraday: I was wrong!Desmond: See you in another life, bruthas!

What if the final season of Lost will tell the story of the all-new, all-different, Ben-free history of the castaways, which will include a moment where Jack and Sayid find ''one of them'' in Rousseau's nets, and when they go and investigate, they will find a guy that they don't recognize, a guy who will call himself ''Henry Gale,'' a guy who was always meant to be on the Island and rule the Others instead of Ben, a guy we know as...John Locke?

Like I said: crazy and twisted. Lost would never really do that. Right? But I do like my Coma Boy Ben conjecture, so I'm placing $10 with Milo, my local Lost bookie, on its accuracy.

"****": ON THE SETAs it happens, I visited the Oahu set of Lost back in January while they were shooting "****.'' Somehow, I escaped the experience without anyone letting anything slip about the Sayid-shooting-Young Ben thing or its outcome. But I did learn that *****

During my day on the Lost lot, I saw many things that were still mysteries to me, as at that point I had only seen the season premiere. Jughead sat on the grass, covered by a tarp. A Hydra Station outrigger was parked on a trailer. Inside a soundstage, I sat inside the fuselage of Ajira 316 to scribble some notes and lurked in the doorway of the Dharma security station in order to watch cast and crew film a scene on another set right next door. I saw Jack, Kate, Hurley, and Miles ponder time travel conundrums, and witnessed a spoiler-sensitive moment involving ****, the significance of which only now makes total sense to me.

Matthew Fox was in a good mood. The day before, his favorite NFL team, the Philadelphia Eagles, had beaten the New York Giants in the NFC Divisional Playoffs, earning them the right to...lose to the Arizona Cardinals the following week. (Glad I didn't visit then.) ''I feel very fortunate to be able to play someone like Jack Shephard,'' Fox told me. ''When we were shooting the pilot, I remember talking with Damon [Lost executive producer Damon Lindelof] about how we didn't want to make Jack the guy who was the 'knight in shining armor' or 'the classic hero.' It seemed like an antiquated, unrealistic version of heroism. We were really trying to look at a new way at looking at heroes.''

Fox describes Jack's journey on Lost like this: ''We set him up to be a hero in the eyes of people on the island — they needed that — but he really wasn't that, or he felt like he couldn't be that. And so we broke him down to where he was desperately trying to hold onto the idea that he can control his reality, that logic and reason and science are the real dictators of the world, not fate and magic. He then felt like his only way out was to take his own life. Failing that, he then moved to a place where he was finally forced to consider that he was probably wrong, that probably Locke was right, and probably the only way he can find any redemption or any salvation in this universe is to go back to the very place that he tried to leave and get back to whatever fated destiny that place has for him. Playing that has been a pretty extraordinary opportunity. A f---ing challenge the whole way through, but it's been really cool experience.''

I asked Fox to describe the state of Jack as we currently find him at this point of the season, and his answer speaks to the quiet, patient, humbled hero that has returned to the Island. ''Coming back to the Island, he gains strength just by being in its proximity,'' he explained. ''I've always believed part of what was destroying him was his actual lack of physical proximity to the Island. He is fated to do something on the Island, but in fighting to get away from that, the Island was destroying him from afar. Now, he's wide-eyed and alert and watching for his destiny. He doesn't have any idea how he's going to know it, or when he's going to know it. But when the moment comes, he will realize he's in the path of his own destiny. And when he's clicked into it, he can start taking action without over-dictating, without trying to control his reality, to just do what it is he's meant to do.''Wow. How very Carlos Castaneda. Carlos Castaneda, you say? Yes: Carlos Castaneda, I say! My epic, consciousness-expanding explanation is to come, right after...

ALLIES, MUD SHADOWS, AND ACTS OF WARExploring the mind-blowing collision of Lost and Carlos Castaneda

Pop quiz! Carlos Castaneda is:A. A one-man codex that unlocks the secrets to LostB. The greatest literary red herring Lost has ever dropped into its clue-strewn matrixC. A writer whose work is relevant to Lost in ways too subtle and sophisticated for Doc Jensen to recognize or appreciate

Chances are the answer is C (Milo's odds: 2-1), but this week, I am going to insist the answer is A...which in turn will also serve as compelling testimony for the subversive genius of option B.

Carlos Castaneda was introduced into Lost last week through Young Ben Linus, who served Sayid a paperback copy of the author's 1971 allegedly nonfiction work A Separate Reality with his chicken salad sandwich. ''I've read it twice,'' said the 12-year-old future psycho with the Harry Potter face. (Other books Ben has read twice in his lifetime: Philip K. Dick's novel Valis, thematically similar to A Separate Reality in many ways.) Wanna bet the Dharma Initiative's resident post-hippie mystic, Oldham, got Ben hooked on Castaneda? (Milo's odds: 5-2.) After all, A Separate Reality — the sequel to The Teachings of Don Juan — purports to be an account of Castaneda's continued tutelage under a Mexican shaman named Don Juan. It focuses on the practice of ''seeing,'' or the ability to look through the illusion of consensual reality and perceive and experience the spiritual infrastructure of the world and all living things...with the help of psychotropic drugs like peyote.

Castaneda's larger body of thought — revealed over the course of 11 increasingly weird books — argues that there is more to life than just a busy-busy struggle to survive, and that individuals have access to greater awareness, knowledge, and power than they allow themselves. People should strive to become ''warrior-travelers,'' and their heroic quest is to constantly unlearn and relearn ''the idea of ourselves'' and our conception of reality. Nobody on Lost embodies this better than John Locke, whose awkward ''Man of Faith'' evolution resembles Castaneda's trial-and-error vision of growth. Sayid's arc in ''He's Our You'' was a classic allegory for Castaneda conversion: A soul, trapped and stuck, defined by the personal baggage of his past and dehumanizing ''consensus reality'' of his society, who finds liberation by modulating the idea of himself — again courtesy of some really, really strong controlled substances.

Trippy stuff. But I could see how it might appeal to an alienated and abused young man like Young Ben Linus, full of yearning to transcend his mundane and miserable adolescence, gain mastery over circumstance, and transform his life into an exciting adventure. The Young Ben that we saw in ''He's Our You'' burned with adolescent rebellion and a very specific anger toward the dehumanizing, despairing lie of his wannabe utopian commune. In retrospect, turning one of Dharma's VW buses — a symbol of hippie-era idealism — into a Molotov cocktail on wheels struck me as a pretty clever act of protest.

Before we dig even deeper into Castaneda and excavate the ideas that will blow your mind with their Lost resonance, let's step back and consider Castaneda in the context of Big Ideas that Lost has thrown at us this season. Through Daniel Faraday, we got a strong dose of quantum physics. ''316'' gave us Christianity (and a wink at Christianity's heretical bad twin, Gnosticism) and an allusion to New Age mysticism. (See: the ''lines of energy'' map in the Lamp-Post, linking the Island to other hotspots of electromagnetic energy around the globe.) ''Namaste'' reminded us that the Dharma Initiative wrapped itself in Buddhism, Hinduism and Egyptian mythology. Now, we have Castaneda and his proto-Matrix philosophy, imported from Toltec mythology. The Western counter-culture of the early '70s was deeply interested in each of these bodies of thought. The New Age movement that emerged out of this era aspired to synthesize many of these strains of spirituality — along with some mystical interpretations of quantum physics — into a veritable Lost-esque super-string theory. Books like The Crack in the Cosmic Egg, The Dancing Wu Li Masters and many others (including Castaneda's entire oeuvre) brought this ambitious project into the mainstream. It was an endeavor deeply indebted to the Theosophists of the late 1800s. (Theosophy was a bid to blend ancient mythology, religious concepts, and new scientific thinking of the time, such as the newfangled electromagnetism of Lost-linked eggheads James Clerk Maxwell and Michael Faraday.) Theosophists dreamed of building ''a universal brotherhood of humanity'' and wanted to ''investigate the unexplained laws of nature and latent powers in man.''

FUN FACT! Lost has cited a number of writers who were deeply influenced by Theosophy, including Aldous Huxley (The Island), L. Frank Baum (The Wizard of Oz), and most recently, James Joyce (Ulysses).

Whew. Right? Bottom line: 1. Clearly, the so-called Me Decades in which Lost is currently parked was a boom time for alternative religion and new delivery systems of old-time spirituality; and 2. The aforementioned Big Ideas share one Very Big Idea in common, a serious interest in what happens to us after we kick the bucket.

Which brings us back to Castaneda. According to the writer, the warrior-traveler seeking life-changing, mind-expanding enlightenment is sometimes aided — and sometimes menaced — in his or her quest by otherworldly or ''inorganic'' beings. Often times, they take forms chosen by the subconscious. Indeed, sometimes they are nothing but projections of our subconscious, but we don't recognize them as such. These entities stick to their own turf, but can quite easily pass through the ''band of energy'' that separates our respective dimensions to interact with human beings. Would-be warrior-travelers need to confront, engage, and master these entities in order to gain knowledge. Once mastered, these hostile entities are known by a new name: ''the Allies.'' These ''Allies'' don't mind too much being mastered by their human friends. Indeed, they often forge partnerships with them and are willing to submit to their leadership. APPLICATION TO LOST: The Hostiles/the Others = ''the Allies.'' Ben's visions of his mother in the jungle = Ally as ''subconscious projection.'' Sonic Fence = ''Band of Energy.'' (Remember what Richard told Horace? ''Your fence can't keep us out.'' An ''Ally'' can say the same thing.) The Others' leadership structure = the Ally/warrior-traveler partnership.

According to Castaneda, there is one particularly monstrous inorganic entity that can rarely, if ever, be tamed: a creature known as a ''mud shadow'' or ''flyer.'' Castaneda writes: ''The flyers are an essential part of the universe...and they must be taken as what they really are — awesome, monstrous. They are the means by which the universe tests us.'' APPLICATION TO LOST: Hellllo, Smokey.

Finally, there is this. And I love this part. Castaneda believed that the final stage — the ''definitive journey'' — of a warrior-traveler's life was to prepare himself for more adventures and greater work in the afterlife, or what he called ''the active side of eternity.'' This preparation required shoring up a very firm, very fixed sense of identity that can survive the brutal segue into What Lies Beyond and can thrive there. In order to accomplish this task, warrior-travelers have to do one thing before they die: produce their own super-duper, back-story-revealing flashback episode of Lost.

''I suggest that you gather a collection of the memorable events of your life.... Every warrior, as a matter of duty, collects an album that reveals the warrior's personality, an album that attests to the circumstances of his life. Above all, it is like an album of pictures made out of memories, the recollection of memorable events; memorable because they have a special significance in one's life. Put in it the complete account of various events that have had profound significance for you. Not every event has a profound significance for you. There are a few, however, that I would consider likely to have changed things for you, to have illuminated your path.... Such an album is an exercise in discipline and impartiality. Consider this album to be an act of war. As such, it has all the meaning in the world.''

The active side of infinity. That's a pretty cool way of thinking about the Island. A collection of memorable events...an album that reveals the warrior's personality.... That's a pretty on-the-nose characterization of five seasons' worth of soul-baring, history-revealing, character-defining flashback storytelling. It also harkens back very specifically to the season 3 episode ''Greatest Hits,'' in which a death-bound Charlie, preparing for his own ''definitive journey,'' compiled a conceptual album of ''memorable events'' of ''profound significance'' that summarized his life — or, as Castaneda might argue, effectively defined the idea of Charlie that would progress into infinity.

Consider this album to be an act of war. And suddenly my Lost-soaked mind whooshes to what Charles Widmore told John Locke during his Jeremy Bentham digression. ''[T]here's a war coming, John. And if you're not back on the Island when that happens, the wrong side is going to win.''

Honestly, I'm not sure what Charlie Widmore's War is really going to be all about. You know me: I'm all for some cosmic clash between good and evil, à la The Stand, The Chronicles of Narnia, Star Wars, Harry Potter, The Matrix, and all the other fantasy pop classics that Lost uses as touchstones. And yet, I now wonder if Chuck was speaking of a more figurative kind of ''war.'' The boot camps that Ben, Widmore, and/or the Island have put the castaways through this season have been psychological and spiritual in nature. We've seen Jack morph from ''Man of Science'' to ''Man Willing To Be Open To Out-There Possibilities.'' We've seen Sawyer transition from selfish rogue to responsible leader. We've seen Sayid modulate his inner killer. We've seen Locke's destiny-starved sucker gain some wisdom. Everyone is changing their core idea; everyone is ''moving their island,'' if you will. (''I-land''?) And if we were to take this Castaneda all the way, you just have to wonder if the reason all these shifts are now happening is because these characters' ''definitive journey'' is at hand, a perilous passage as terrifying as war.

Put the final touches on those memory albums, castaways, because I think you're all about to die.

And then, I think they're all going to become born again, courtesy of time travel/time loop/Island resurrection magic. Who will awaken changed and improved by his or her past life? Who will awaken lost all over again? And which side in the great Widmore/Ben conflict benefits from changed souls — and which side doesn't? Season 6 will tell us...unless, of course, the preceding 1,700 words are just totally, wrong-headedly irrelevant. In which case, see Answer ''B.''

Lost's Michael Emerson had warned TVGuide.com readers that moments would come along this season where you leap off the sofa and shout, "They can't do that! Can they...?" One such shocker expelled from Sayid's gun and landed in a young Benjamin Linus' chest at the end of last week's episode. Sterling Beaumon, 13, shared with us a look at how that blast in the past may change Ben's future. Or not.

TVGuide.com: I know you've done episodes of ER, Heroes and Bones. But was Lost your first death scene?Sterling Beaumon: No, actually. I was on Crossing Jordan and I had to lie on a coroner's table for almost the whole episode. And on ER, I died in the end, with a tumor in my brain....

TVGuide.com: Of course, my question presumes that Young Ben died from Sayid's gunshot. Might that not be the case?Beaumon: You'll have to watch and find out. ****

TVGuide.com: Regardless of whether young Ben dies or not, will there be repercussions for what Sayid did?Beaumon: It will be talked about quite often. That scene may have the greatest significance of any on this show.

TVGuide.com: I read in a previous interview that when you first appeared on Lost (during Season 3), you were warned not to mimic Michael Emerson, because Ben wasn't that Ben yet. Is it safe to say he now is?Beaumon: Not quite yet....

TVGuide.com: Something more would have to happen to put him on that path?Beaumon: Yes. And that Ben.... Well, if you go back in the season to when they first met up with [Amy], they tell Daniel, "We can't interfere, because we can't change time," and Daniel says, "It doesn't matter now, because we're stuck here." ****

TVGuide.com: OK. I was going to say, Who better to carry out the massacre in a few years than a presumed-dead, angry Ben, but....Beaumon: ****

TVGuide.com: How many kids did you beat out for this role?Beaumon: There were, like, four pages of sign-ins for the first audition.

TVGuide.com: Did you wear a version of Ben's tell-tale glasses for the audition?Beaumon: No, because we did not even know who the character was. He was called "Young Andrew," and it wasn't even a scene from the "Man Behind the Curtain" episode.

TVGuide.com: Do your eyes look like Michael Emerson's just naturally?Beaumon: That was one of the requirements. The kid had to have blue eyes and brown hair.

TVGuide.com: Before we go, you said you had a few things you wanted to clear up....Beaumon: Yes, I was just reading the message boards — I know, I'm so bad — and there are some things I want to address. For example, Ben arrived on the island in 1974, when he was 12 years old. Now it's three years later, so he's like 14 or 15. When Sayid refers to "12-year-old Ben" [in the episode "He's Our You"], he just didn't know. They will later say how old I really am. Also, some people are thinking that Ben killed his dad in the van fire that he set; he didn't. Older Ben killed his dad in, like, 1995. Those are just a few things I'm seeing out there.

TVGuide.com: All noted. So, what's next for you after Lost?Beaumon: I have an animated feature coming out, Astro Boy, with Nicolas Cage, Freddie Highmore and Madeline Carroll, the girl who plays [Ben's childhood friend] Annie. Everyone is like, "The Island, it wants you two to work together!" [Laughs]

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

When last we tuned into ABC's Lost, (at least some) fans were pleasantly surprised to see Juliet and Sawyer find a groovy kind of love there in the 1970s. But can their romance stand the test of "time" — especially now that Kate is back in the mix? Elizabeth Mitchell shared a look at the twists ahead.

TVGuide.com: We're sneaking this Q&A in just before the producers lower a "cone of silence" onto the cast members, at least until you have filmed the season finale. Pretty crazy, huh?Elizabeth Mitchell: Yeah, pretty much! Once again, it's one of those highly secret, highly crazy, "You think it's one thing but it's another thing" kind of endings. There are still about six pages missing [from the finale script] that only the people involved in it have.

TVGuide.com: I'm worried now, that you don't have those six pages.Mitchell: [Laughs] I didn't have the six pages last time, or the time before that. I was like, "Tell me, tell me! No, don't tell me."

TVGuide.com: It seems like these next nine episodes will be a lot to digest.Mitchell: They will. "LaFleur" was one of those little "eyes of the storm." You've been storming, you've been storming, you get to the middle and you're like, "Oh, it's not so bad. It's kind of nice here! I'll wait around here and take a deep breath." And then you start right in. It should be pretty exciting.

TVGuide.com: What went through your mind as you learned of the Juliet-Sawyer love story?Mitchell: There's my initial feelings, my middle feelings, and then my feelings now. At first, Josh [Holloway] and I were like, "Nuh-uh! That's never going to work!"

TVGuide.com: But surely you had an inkling they'd go that way, after the storylines got split.Mitchell: I think I even said, "I don't think that sounds like a very good idea at all." But then as the season went along, I realized there were these little asides and glances... Both Josh and I were like, "We don't know about this." But luckily — and I mean this very, very sincerely — it became something I'm very happy with. Josh turned to me the other day and said, "Hey, that's pretty good huh?" I said, "Yeah, it kinda works!"

TVGuide.com: But even if you did see this hook-up coming, one could never have predicted the weight given to it via time-travel.Mitchell: Josh and I were sitting in a canoe, doing a scene, and I said, "You know, they're not going to have us have mad, passionate love up against a tree. They're probably going to, like, have us already have been married for three years." He was like, "No, they're not going to do that. That's just ridiculous." So when he got the ["LaFleur"] script, he was like, "That's creepy!"

TVGuide.com: Do you feel cheated or honored to get clean-shaven Sawyer?Mitchell: Oh, very honored - but I kinda get both, because we're always flashing [through time]. He's kind of ridiculously good-looking regardless of what he does, so I try not to concentrate on that too much.

TVGuide.com: Has it been in the back of Juliet's head that Kate could return to the island someday?Mitchell: Yeah, I do think it's been there. But I also think that at some point in time, because three years is so long, she actually came to believe that maybe this might work. Maybe that came to her just in the last two months before [Kate, Jack et al] showed up, but for the first time in her life there was a grain of hope. So I think that it's very sad for her.

TVGuide.com: Does any insecurity register on Juliet when she first learns Kate is back?Mitchell: I think so. Juliet is torn in a lot of different directions. She's torn that Kate is there, I think she's torn over how Sawyer is going to respond to it.... It's very telling that he doesn't saying anything at first about Kate being there. Juliet's just busy reading him, but of course there must be massive worry about [Kate's return].

TVGuide.com: Juliet, in turn, must have her own reaction to seeing Jack again.Mitchell: *** It will be very interesting to see how people feel about their moments together.

TVGuide.com: What are Juliet's priorities now?Mitchell: Juliet has a couple of priorities, one of which of course is being in love, and that's figuring quite heavily in the writers' minds. And there's always the thing of, "How do I get my life back? How do I keep my sister and her child safe?" They are in this eye of the storm, this little hiatus, and that's new for her. Good lord, she's working in the motor pool, so she's not even trying to save lives! For the first time in her life, she's quite peaceful and living. ****

TVGuide.com: When I spoke to Reiko Aylesworth (Amy), she seemed to hint that ****Mitchell: ****

TVGuide.com: And 11-year-old Ben is lurking around somewhere...Mitchell: Of course he's there. He has to be. So it will be very interesting to see how that goes.

TVGuide.com: Speaking Latin must have been one of the hardest things you've had to do for the show.Mitchell: But you know what, I liked it. Part of me is kind of a brainiac so I thought it'd be cool if I spoke Latin anyway. There's that joy where you're talking to someone and all of a sudden you break off [into an unexpected language]. So yeah, it was difficult, but I thought it was pretty awesome!